


Why fight the Pain when the Pain is Endless?

by musicalgirl4474



Series: Whumptober 2020 [31]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alex isn't in a good emotional state, Angst, Historically accurate homophobia, Hurt Alexander Hamilton, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, It's both at the same time, M/M, Whipping, Whumptober 2020, but those didn't really exist in the 1700s., he needs a therapist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-01
Updated: 2020-11-01
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:28:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27322753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musicalgirl4474/pseuds/musicalgirl4474
Summary: It's not a good thing to be exposed as gay during the revolutionary war. You get punished. Usually worse than what happens in this fic, actually.Whumptober #31 (last one!)Today's Special: TortureExperiment/Whipped/Left BehindIt's the middle one. Kind of the last one if you squint, I'll tell you why if you ask.
Relationships: Alexander Hamilton/John Laurens
Series: Whumptober 2020 [31]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1956718
Comments: 14
Kudos: 48





	Why fight the Pain when the Pain is Endless?

Pain lances through Alexander’s back and he grits his teeth against a scream. John already looks wrecked enough from where Meade and Lafayette hold him back from interfering, he will not add to his love’s guilt by making his pain any more obvious than it likely is. The physical pain is not the thing that hurts him the most in any case. He had opened his heart again. Opened his affections for a paternal figure, and that affection was being as firmly stamped out now as it had when his father had left. Because Washington is wielding the whip.

Another stripe of pain makes fire across his shoulders and he grunts. He has been shackled to the make-shift whipping post at the edge of camp, and he spares a moment to be grateful that this was not overly public. Sure, it was done to preserve the General’s and John’s standings, but it would have been too much to bear the scorn of all-and-sundry in camp. Bleakly, Alexander wondered if he would be drummed out as well. Or was he perhaps valuable enough that it would only be the whipping? A relative slap on the wrist?

Another stripe of pain, this one low across his waist, and Alexander collapses forward against the post, a sob wrenched from him. He hears John let out an answering sob and fights back the words that come to his mouth. It would not do to make things worse. Another line of burning pain, this time down his back, crossing the other three lines. There is no blood yet, but from the pain Alexander guesses that the General is using his full strength. Showing no mercy, not even to his supposed favorite. Hamilton would laugh at the absurdity of the claim if it would not make those around him wonder if he had lost his sanity. Perhaps he had. Perhaps each lash was taking a little more of his sanity.

Despite his intention not to look at John, he seeks his love’s eyes. It shocks him when he sees the tears on his face, his eyes desperate. Alexander wants to speak words of encouragement, to say that he is fine. That it doesn’t even hurt that much. But sudden, quick stripes of pain keep the words stuck in his throat. He gasps for breath as the pain crests and is gone, and he’s lost count now. How many lashes in a row had that been? Washington had sentenced him to fifty lashes. Fifty lashes for daring to love another man.

Alexander can feel rage seething within him, making his muscles tense and his teeth clench. He keeps his eyes stubbornly on John, though he can see Lafayette’s tears as well. The poor boy, he was from a place where you did not punish someone for who they loved or where they found their comfort. But he was doing an admirable job of keeping John from doing something foolhardy, Alexander would have to thank him later, if he ever saw him again.

It is somewhere near the twentieth lash that Alexander feels his skin break, and his knees buckle. His wrists will be raw and bloody by the time this is through, but he no longer has it in him to be angry. Not at John, not at Washington, not even at the officer who had reported their . . . transgression. He is only angry at himself. He should have been less obvious, more discrete. He should have known nothing good ever lasted. He only ever hurt those he cared about, those who cared about him. His father left, his mother died, his cousin commited suicide, his town, who cared for a penniless orphan, destroyed in a hurricane. Now Washington’s hand had been forced to whip his chief of staff, and poor John had to watch his love be hurt.

He starts crying then, small, hiccoughing sobs hitching his breath as blood slides, almost tickling, down his back. He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he was a valuable member of Washington’s staff. That this whipping would delay his own work, throw a wrench in plans the general might have had. Alexander brought trouble everywhere he went. Maybe it would have been better for everyone, himself included, if he had never been born.

It had been the birth of his older brother that had cemented his mother being lawfully branded a whore, but his own eventual existence had not helped matters. If he was drummed out, maybe Alexander would just lay down and let the eventual infections from the weeping wounds in his back kill him. No more sadness. No more- his thoughts are derailed yet again by a sudden flurry of pain. His face is a wet, itching mess of tears and snot, and he wonders if John will even be able to bring himself to look at him after this. He hopes so. God, he hopes John does not hate him for this.

Alexander does not think he blacks out, but the new pains pass in something of a blur after that. He is too exhausted and in pain to think of much of anything, he just wants it to end; he feels like a wounded animal, he wants to crawl into a dark, close space and lick his wounds. Or die.

He vaguely recognizes that he is shivering, but feels oddly numb. Isn’t the shivering supposed to stop once one is numb? Then there are hands at his burning, abraded wrists, and he whimpers. Is there to be yet more pain?

His wrists are freed from the cuffs of the whipping post, and there are soft murmurs in his ear. “It’s done, Hammy, all done.” Tilghman? The man seemed almost sad, lips chapped and red as if he had been biting at them.

“Done?” Alexander asks, and his voice rasps in his throat. Had he screamed? He doesn’t think he had screamed. Maybe it is simply due to his thirst.

“You took it well, so well. Hush now, we will get you back to headquarters and have the doctor look you over, bind you up.” There are other hands now, but Alexander keeps his eyes on Tench’s face. It is a kind face. None of the reprobation he knows he deserves for being such a curse on those who care for him.

His back is jostled, and Alexander gladly lets darkness take him, though the pain follows him even there.

**Author's Note:**

> GUYS. THIS WAS HARD FOR ME TO WRITE. I don't know how many of you are aware of this and/or care, but the U.S. Supreme Court is now 6-3 conservative majority. The two conservative leaders on the court recently (by which I mean at some point in the last couple weeks) wrote an 'opinion' about how the decision which made gay marriage legal should be overturned. I've had feels about this for a while. Um. This story was a bit cathartic to write in that I was able to put pain onto the electronic page. I would like to get married if I ever find the right person. Um. So. Yeah.
> 
> I hope y'all enjoyed whumptober. I'll probably continue at least a few of the series that started from this project.
> 
> *bows out*


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